SIREN: DNT PROGRESS AT THE W3C? — Negotiators looking to strike a deal on the Internet privacy standard are headed to Boston this week for their sixth face-to-face meeting, and leading participants from both privacy and advertising camps tell MT that they’re about to hammer out the details of one of the group’s first wins in quite a while. There’s an in-principle agreement between top reps on both sides to create rules that would dictate how long third-party advertisers could retain a user’s browsing history, stakeholders — including group Co-Chairman Peter Swire — told MT.

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“Today, your search terms and the specific names of the pages you’ve read get collected automatically in clickstream data. The pages people read are routinely logged and we don’t have clear rules about blocking the long-term storage of the details of people’s browsing history,” he said. “The idea is to have new and effective techniques to strictly limit the time that those detailed browsing histories.”

What that limit would be, Swire said, is supposed to start getting figured out this afternoon in snowy Massachusetts — though it’s not completely clear how pervasive the deal is. Stu Ingis, general counsel at the Digital Advertising Alliance, told MT there was “absolutely no agreement.” If there is, though, it’d be a feather in the cap of Swire — even as other DNT issues remain — who was brought on late last year to right the struggling ship that was an unproductive and sometimes bitter W3C process, lest the Federal Trade Commission step in and endorse Do Not Track legislation.

PRYOR TO TAKE OVER KERRY’S OLD SUBCOMMITTEE? -- Senate Commerce subcommittee assignments will come down at the panel’s Wednesday business meeting, and MT hears there may be a shuffle in the works on the tech-oriented panels: The word is that Sen. Mark Pryor is slated to take the gavel on the Communications, Technology and Internet Subcommittee, which was vacated by Sen. John Kerry’s move to Foggy Bottom. Pryor’s office didn’t get back to us, but that would presumably open up the top slot on the consumer protection panel, where he served last session. The full committee, of course, will have to ratify the rosters on Wednesday, and MT nation should also expect a priorities rundown of sorts — the level of detail remaining uncertain — from Chairman Jay Rockefeller.

SENATE PANEL SITS DOWN ON IMMIGRATION -- Lawmakers in the upper chamber have been chatty on immigration reform since a bipartisan gaggle of lawmakers unveiled the contours of a comprehensive package two weeks ago, but one of the first official moves on the issue comes this week with a judiciary panel hearing on Wednesday. Most notably for tech, the morning event will feature testimony from AOL founder Steve Case, who will talk about businesses’ need for more skilled immigrant visas. Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano and journalist Jose Antonio Vargas, among others, are also set to weigh in.

--WHAT TO WATCH: Eventually, we’re going to get more details from senators about just what the comprehensive proposal would look like in legislative form. Watch the questions Wednesday and statements this week for an inkling of where judiciary lawmakers stand on both the main proposal — which Democratic leadership has committed to sending through committee — as well as the tech-backed I-Squared Act.

GOOD MONDAY MORNING and welcome to Morning Tech, where we mounted a TV, hung a shelf and put up drapes this weekend, thank you very much. If you need to borrow a half-inch socket wrench — or even if you just want to talk tech — shoot us an email at abyers@politico.com and @ byersalex. Catch the rest of the team’s contact info after speed read.

ALSO AT JUDICIARY: MEDINE BACK ON THE DOCKET — President Barack Obama’s nominee to chair the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight board is set to be considered Thursday morning at the Senate panel’s third meeting of the week. The committee tends not to vote on nominations during the first meeting a name is up for debate, so we may not get an answer from lawmakers this week — but Medine was already passed out of committee last year on a party-line vote, so that could speed things along. Of course, that doesn’t mean it’s smooth sailing for the nominee, who languished in limbo for all of 2012. Sen. Chuck Grassley, the judiciary panel’s top Republican, blocked Medine’s unanimous consent confirmation at the beginning of the year, on the grounds that he wasn’t properly considered by the full body. “I am not opposed to discussing controversial nominations, but they need to be done in a way that allows debate and discussion prior to a vote,” Grassley said in January. “Given the controversial responses to written questions this nominee provided, there is need for debate and discussion on this nomination by the full Senate, not unanimous consent at the last minute.”

** A message from QUALCOMM: Reading this on your smartphone or tablet? Catching the latest tech policy news on the go? If you're using a 3G or a 4G device, that's Qualcomm technology in your pocket, your purse, your briefcase and your home. Qualcomm: Leading the mobile revolution. http://www.qualcomm.com/ **

ISSUE DU JOUR: CYBERSECURITY — Yeah, it never really went away, but this week could be a key one for the cyber watchers, as President Obama delivers his State of the Union address (with an attached cyber executive order, perhaps?) and House lawmakers get set to reintroduce CISPA, their controversial information-sharing bill. You remember that measure from last year, when it earned a veto threat from the White House and had tech and privacy advocates in a frenzy second only to what we saw over SOPA. But Mike Rogers, the bill’s chief sponsor, says it’s a measure that can pass — and so Congress should do that and address thornier issues later. On “Face The Nation” Sunday, he criticized the W.H. approach on cyber as "too slow, too cumbersome," and said it’d be better to tackle the administration’s desire for regulatory standards for critical infrastructure later this year. Tony Romm has more: http://politi.co/U40tAw

YOU’VE HEARD OF STEM? MEET STEAM — We’ve got another acronym for you to remember — and a new congressional caucus to go along with it. The STEAM caucus, co-chaired by Reps. Suzanne Bonamici and Aaron Schock, was formed last month to promote the integration of arts education in conjunction with traditional STEM fields. The lawmakers are holding a briefing this Thursday to introduce the group and its goals, and officials from the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office and National Endowment for the Arts will speak. Bonamici and Schock have also sent out a Dear Colleague letter across the Hill to get the word out and drum up support.

PERRY CAGEY ON CALIF. TRIP -- Texas Gov. Rick Perry was set to embark to California Sunday on a business-outreach trip that includes stops in San Francisco and Silicon Valley, but the details of the Republican's itinerary aren't clear. "We are keeping all of the company meetings confidential just for competitive and proprietary reasons," spokeswoman Lucy Nashed told MT. "He's not planning on any open press events." The confidentiality is at the companies' request, Nashed said. Still, the pitch to tech companies from the economic development group backing Perry's trip probably offers some clues about what kind of companies he'll hit up. The "Texas advantage" focuses on four factors: San Antonio as a cybersecurity hub for the military and contractors; Texas as prime real estate for data centers; an already-thriving scene for video-game companies; and Texas Enterprise Fund money to attract Web-services companies. http://bit.ly/14MjNo2

PELOSI PUSHES BACK ON VIDEO GAME/VIOLENCE CORRELATION — The House minority leader got the question on Fox News Sunday from Chris Wallace, who prefaced by dismissing the idea of a new study to investigate the connection between media violence and gun deaths: “Why don't you go to your friends in Hollywood and challenge them? Shame them, and say, 'Knock it off?'" Pelosi stood her ground:"I understand what you are saying. I'm a mother, I'm a grandmother,” she said. “But, they — not Hollywood, but the evidence — says that, in Japan, for example, they have the most violent games and the lowest death, mortality, from guns. I don't know what the explanation is for that except they may have good gun laws." More, from the Huffington Post: http://huff.to/WRiIYj

IP GROUP TELLS USTR: EYES ON UKRAINE — The deadline closed Friday on submissions to the U.S. Trade Representative’s annual report on countries that are breeding grounds for piracy and copyright violation, but not before perennial influencer International Intellectual Property Alliance filed its 2013 submission. The key takeaway from this year’s filing: Ukraine is a problem child that fosters rampant digital and hard-copy piracy, in addition to using unlicensed software in government. The IIPA report calls for the country to be designated as a Priority Foreign Country, which could subject it sanctions. (No country received the distinction last year.) The official USTR 301 report will come out in April as usual, but some tech groups are renewing their concerns that the process is not clear or transparent. From Public Knowledge’s comments: “Independent review and evaluation is vital to the Special 301 process because it would protect against the risk of false or exaggerated claims by commenters, particularly those claims made without any citation to their sources.”

** A message from QUALCOMM: Reading this on your smartphone or tablet? Catching the latest tech policy news on the go? If you're using a 3G or a 4G device, that's Qualcomm technology in your pocket, your purse, your briefcase and your home. Qualcomm: Leading the mobile revolution. http://www.qualcomm.com/

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About The Author

Alex Byers is a technology reporter for POLITICO Pro. He was previously a senior Web producer at POLITICO, where he helped run POLITICO's Twitter and Facebook accounts. Before joining the Web team, he graduated from The George Washington University, where he served as the 2009-10 editor-in-chief of The GW Hatchet, the school's award-winning student newspaper.

Previously, he has interned at washingtonpost.com, Dateline NBC and General Mills Inc. He hails from Minneapolis and is an avid Twins fan, musician and golfer.